Telecommunicating
by Mischa1
Summary: A simple bug hits Scully harder than it normally would, but Doggett is there to catch her when she falls.


Telecommunicating  
by Mischa  
mischablue@iprimus.com.au  
  
Spoilers: general S8 up to 'DeadAlive'  
Timeline: Set in the 'DeadAlive' three month interval  
between Mulder's burial and exhumation.  
Keywords: Doggett, Scully, and Mulder makes a cameo  
appearance.  
Category: S, DSF/UST, a touch of odd H  
Summary: A simple bug hits Scully harder than it normally  
would, but Doggett is there to catch her when she falls.  
Another small but significant step in a strengthening  
partnership takes place, thanks to a fever dream.  
Disclaimer: These characters belong to Chris Carter, 1013,  
FOX, and of course to RP, GA and DD. Although apparently  
when it comes down to it, they're actually the property of  
Rupert Murdoch. And on the note of weird legalities, I mean  
no infringement and am making no money so don't bother  
suing.  
Archive: SHODDSters, yes; Ephemeral, yes; Gossamer, yes;  
XFMU, yes; all others just drop me a line.  
Author's Note: My contribution to the Chicken Soup for the  
SHODDS Soul series, in honour of our illustrious captain DB.  
Dedication: For DB, of course!   
  
* * * *  
  
The migraine and the ache in her throat are bad enough, but  
it's the tinnitus that is driving her to distraction.  
Scully's used to ignoring the painful ringing sound, but at  
work and in close proximity to computers, telephones and the  
whirring of fluorescent lights it's harder to dismiss. The  
background noise is particularly grating today on her  
eardrums.  
  
The same medical reasons for why her ears are ringing are  
also causing her thoughts to drift. She wonders if it's  
being caused by subversive government signals being  
transmitted into her mind through radio waves. Or maybe the  
computers are sentient, sending subliminal messages to her  
through its soft hums.  
  
Scully decides at that very moment that whatever it is, it's  
driving her mad. An madness that the Lone Gunmen would be  
proud of, but insanity nonetheless.  
  
She can't deny, however, that it's not a signal being sent  
to her alone. Doggett appears even more carefully attuned to  
her today than usual; keeping a close eye on her as they  
worked, getting her cups of water before she even lifted her  
head to ask. His constant concerned surveillance has been  
more of a comfort than Scully is willing to admit. Somehow,  
knowing it would take only a reflex action for him to catch  
her if she fell makes her less anxious about falling.  
  
Trying to work out whether or not Doggett is surreptitiously  
observing her is not an easy task, but she watches him back  
anyway. It's his hands that have her attention this time,  
placing his completed paperwork into a folder. It wouldn't  
take too much, she thinks for a wild reckless second, to  
just ask him to give her a massage. Slow, deep, calming  
circles at her temples, through her hair, soothing away the  
tenseness building in her skull...  
  
Rationality takes over, as always. There are boundaries in  
this partnership, as in all, and she doesn't want to cross  
them. And so her idle thought passes by unacknowledged. She  
makes a steadied effort not to look at his hands when he  
places them on her desk.  
  
"Six o'clock's come and gone, Agent Scully. Wanna get  
something to eat?"  
  
"We've been here that long?" she asks, and immediately  
chastises herself for the slip. All she wanted, she had said  
to herself all day, was that she wanted more time, and now  
the working hours were long again and she hadn't finished  
everything she'd wanted to get done.  
  
"Agent Scully?" In the few weeks since Mulder's burial  
Doggett has seen the occasional distracted gaze break  
through her resolved professional mask, and learned  
quickly when to call her on it and when to leave it alone.  
All the same, Scully has made a careful effort not to rely  
on her partner too much in that time, fearing she may sap  
his staid support, his strength. An irrational fear,  
unfounded, she knows, but enough of a reason for her to hold  
back.  
  
She makes an effort to smile, but he still watches her. "I'm  
fine, Agent Doggett."  
  
He doesn't look convinced. Scully looks back down at her  
neat pile of unfinished paperwork forms, avoiding his  
piercing, searching gaze. The ringing in her head sounds  
like a field teeming with cicadas. Maybe a call centre  
bullpen at peak hour. Probably both.  
  
She looks up, wishing she could look at her partner in  
silence, and thinks that it is definitely both.  
  
* * * *  
  
The next morning she doesn't bother slapping at the alarm,  
much less getting up. The noise doesn't bother her. It's  
merely a background track to the noise in her head.  
  
Scully focuses aching eyes to the blank ceiling, half  
regretting not taking up Doggett's offer of dinner. Only  
half, because although the baby had apparently conspired  
with her stomach in a kick-box of a protest, she knows she  
wouldn't be able to hold down anything anyway.  
  
It's that particular thought that eventually drags her out  
of bed.  
  
When she looks in the mirror, Scully rolls her eyes at her  
reflection and heads to the kitchen, trying to find  
agreeable food to work with the medication she throws in her  
mouth as she moves. She grabs the phone along the way and  
calls in sick to Skinner's secretary, who immediately  
patches the call in to the Assistant Director. It's brief  
and to the point.  
  
"Scully?"  
  
"I'll be all right, sir."  
  
"If you need anything --"  
  
"Of course."  
  
She doesn't need to ask him to drown out the sound of a  
phone ringing in the background, because they hang up  
shortly after that.  
  
She thinks about calling Doggett as she walks into her  
kitchen, knowing he would be worried. Illness has never hit  
her this hard in a long time, but she knows it's a compound  
effort -- the weakness of winter, on top of her insistence  
on going back to work, and Mulder... For all the strength  
and will of the mind, at some point the body will revolt,  
and she's reached that point. Exhaustion, grief, and stress  
has not caused her sickness, but neither had they helped.  
  
She suspects that Doggett understands that, more than he  
ever lets on.  
  
Scully glares at the carton of innocently formed eggs  
sitting in her fridge as she prepares her meal. Food  
prepared, Scully muses over the ease with which this illness  
managed to overtake her as she picks up the phone to call  
her partner. She finds herself staring blankly at a worn  
spot on the benchtop, the meal forgotten, when the knocking  
begins.  
  
* * * *  
  
The temptation to lean against the door when she opens it is  
too great, but she is standing straight and tall as she can  
possibly be when she sees who is on the other side.  
  
"Agent Scully?"  
  
"Agent Doggett."  
  
The anxiousness etched on his face doesn't clear when he  
gets a long hard look at her. "Figured you wouldn't be in  
after yesterday. A.D. Skinner just called now to confirm  
it. How're you doin'?"  
  
He was worried. Of course he would be worried. She'd never  
made that second call, she had been distant the day before,  
and the baby was beginning to show now, a gentle swell  
rising through her clothes.  
  
"I'm sorry. I meant to call --"  
  
"It's okay," he says immediately, watching her. "But you're  
not, Agent Scully. Come on." Gently Doggett takes her by the  
arm and closes the door behind them, leading her to the  
living room and her couch.  
  
He's been to her apartment several times now, calling in to  
check on her after Mulder's funeral and one time when her  
car broke down and she had a doctor's appointment. Somewhere  
along the way -- she hasn't really taken the time to notice  
the exact moment -- his presence in her life has increased  
substantially, and she couldn't be more thankful for it.  
  
Their partnership, their friendship, has taken leaps and  
bounds with every small gesture. After the inadvertent  
revelation of her pregnancy and his quiet, enduring support  
by her side before and after the funeral, a new well of  
mutual respect has grown and strengthened between them. They  
do their best to be honest. And because she understands  
this, understands him, she assures him with what she  
believes to be the truth.  
  
"I'm okay. Really, Agent Doggett." And with that, she stands  
up.  
  
The only thing keeping her from falling back down again is  
him.  
  
* * * *  
  
"They say that doctors make the worst patients, you know,"  
she says ruefully as he helps her onto the bed.  
  
"I know."  
  
Scully knew Doggett wouldn't play along with her and deny  
the phrase, but she shoots him a mock glare anyway. He  
looks gently amused before the smile slides off his face.  
  
"You're running a fever, Agent Scully. A high one. You  
shouldn't be up at all."  
  
"I made breakfast," she protests, hating the sound of her  
slurred voice.  
  
"And did you eat it?"  
  
Scully can't honestly remember, but Doggett knows she  
didn't, and with the look he sends her she knows he knows  
that she's remembering she didn't.  
  
"Agent Doggett," she begins, trying to sound less confused  
and more professional. She wonders what she could possibly  
say to him that could maintain her distance. "I hope you're  
not thinking of feeding me."  
  
Okay, so maybe professionalism is out of the cards at this  
present half-delirious time. She's silently chastising  
herself as Doggett throws her a lopsided, utterly rakish  
grin. "Always one step ahead of me, Agent Scully."  
  
The mental image amuses them both. Narrowing her eyes,  
Scully half-seriously contemplates asking him anyway just so  
she could bite him for that comment. "I already took my  
medication," she admits, and Doggett's smile fades, his  
forehead creasing further.  
  
"I'll go get your food," he says, and slips out of the room.  
  
Doggett comes back with her plate of untouched food and  
gently nudges her to eat, and it strikes her as odd at how  
comfortable he seems playing the role of personal doctor.  
He's done this before, Scully thinks as she tries to taste  
her bacon, he's held vigil over waking patients, fed them,  
watched over them, nursed them back to health. When? A wife?  
A child? In her foggy mind the image of his comfortable yet  
empty house rises. She can't help but wonder, and makes a  
mental note to ask. Someday when she's a little more lucid  
than this.  
  
She's shivering by the time she feels she's eaten enough.  
Doggett balances the plate on his knees and looks at her  
with concern.  
  
"I'm cold," she says, trying not to let her eyes droop. "But  
that's --"  
  
"I know," he says, reaching over and placing the cool cloth  
on her head. "It's the temperature. Come on, time for you to  
rest."  
  
She shoots him as arch a look as she can possibly achieve  
with the heaviness sinking in her skull, more confused by  
her surprise at his intuition than she is by his intuition  
alone.  
  
"Doggett?" she asks sleepily as she lies back and stares at  
the ceiling.  
  
"Yeah?" His hand feels cold when it's in contact with her  
skin, and she feels as though her centre of gravity is  
moving toward that touch. Scully keeps her eyes tightly  
closed, fighting the waves of dizziness, watching coloured  
spots of crimson and purple dance behind her eyelids.  
  
Curiosity rolls idly in her veins. Her voice is slurred and  
small. The question that comes out of her mouth not the one  
she intended to ask.  
  
"Can you stay?"  
  
She doesn't hear his answer because the red and violet  
flashes in the darkness are replaced by a rolling, soothing  
wave of black, and she falls headlong into sleep.  
  
* * * *  
  
After an interminable period of dreamless darkness, it  
begins.  
  
It's the same kind of dream she always has when she's on the  
brink of breaking through a fever, only she rarely remembers  
it when she's conscious. She's running. Sweating it out. On  
the verge of losing it completely.  
  
The scene swells and recedes. Slow, hypnotising frequency.  
Mountains of random description; moving giant hills that  
seem to crawl and roll of their own volition. They oscillate  
in size between being small enough to fit in the palm of her  
hand or high enough to block the sunlight, and Scully gets  
the feeling she's running on one of them, as well, by the  
way the earth is shifting under her feet. She doesn't  
usually get motion sickness -- a life of travelling long  
weaned her off any potential susceptibility -- but her  
stomach always counts these fever dreams as a strong  
exception to the rule.  
  
Her watch is ticking in her hand. When she looks down she  
observes the second-hand make its slow counter-clockwise  
circuit and doesn't once think that it's odd. Faint music  
plays lightly on the air, and as she keeps running she can  
hear snatches of nursery rhyme, childlike voices carrying  
the song on the wind.  
  
After a while she stops running... or the moving mountains  
slow down, she really doesn't know. All the same, an old  
friend is waiting for her at the end, mouth tinted in a wry  
smile.  
  
"Hey."  
  
"Hi."  
  
She's had her dreams and nightmares about never saying a  
proper goodbye to this man, but tears don't seem to have a  
place in the strange world of the fever dream. There are  
never tears, only words. She glances down at her hands,  
struggling to find the right ones, but her silence says it  
all. They share a painful smile and after a moment she  
extends her hand out to him, passing along the  
counter-clockwise watch.  
  
He takes the offered watch from her, watching the hands'  
reverse movement with a rueful grin. "Who knew that Batman  
and Superman were one and the same?"  
  
"What?"  
  
He holds up a familiar scrap of newspaper, lowering his  
tone to dramatic voiceover. "Faster than a speeding  
bullet... can leap tall buildings in a single bound... Is it  
a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a crazed human bat that likes  
to regurgitate human fingers?"  
  
She smiles. She can't help it.  
  
He stares at her solemnly and changes the subject. "Is he  
catching you, Scully? When you fall?"  
  
If I let myself fall, her silence says. But when she can't  
help it, she knows Doggett's support will hold her. The man  
standing by her acknowledges the fact with a nod.  
  
"Will you catch him too?" he asks quietly. Lead weights of  
importance hang off his question.  
  
She doesn't need to think. "Of course."  
  
Somewhere in the distance a phone rings. Something cool,  
moist and soothing passes across her face.  
  
When she opens her eyes again, Mulder is gone.  
  
* * * *  
  
She's still dreaming yet partly awake now, somehow aware  
that somewhere beyond the clutches of her subconsciousness a  
fever is being sponged away. In her dream Scully is standing  
beside Doggett, and they are staring into the black hole of  
a filing cabinet, files spinning in the darkness, answers  
threatening to remain just out of reach.  
  
He's holding a watch, and she looks down and realises with a  
start that the second hand is moving forward. "Concern's for  
your well-being, Agent Scully. That's all it's ever for."  
  
"I know," Scully says. A hand reaches out to him and he  
places the watch gently onto her palm. The smooth clear  
face shimmers as she stares at it, and the second hand moves  
clockwise to the irregular frequency of her thready pulse.  
She steps forward, and before she can change her mind,  
slides her arms around her partner, knowing he'll anchor her  
if she threatens to drift away.  
  
Scully wonders why the issue of trust has never come up  
between them, why it never needed to be explicitly said. She  
has never needed to ask this man -- his actions tell the  
story alone. And although she already knows the answer to  
the question she's about to ask, she feels a sudden urge to  
ask it anyway.  
  
"Doggett, do you trust me?"  
  
She looks up, eyes questioning, but Doggett is gone, and  
Skinner is standing in his place. She blinks, more startled  
by his sudden presence than the fact that she can see  
through him. "Where's --"  
  
"He's on the other end of the line, Agent Scully," Skinner  
answers. She can see the faint form of starlight through his  
outline. "I suggest you back him up immediately."  
  
"Sir?" she asks, confused. She steps away from her superior  
and turns her head towards the telephone. There is a faint  
ringing. The increasingly lucid part of her mind recognises  
this part of the dream -- soon it will be over, and  
forgotten.  
  
"Hey, pick up the phone, Agent Scully." she can hear a voice  
plead in the distance. She steps closer to the phone and  
hesitates.  
  
"Agent Doggett?"  
  
"I can't get through to you if you don't pick up the phone,"  
the distant voice says. The phone keeps ringing, echoing in  
a skull that feels curiously empty. Scully reaches for it,  
wanting to stop the sounds from slamming against her  
eardrums. She curls her fingers around another person's hand  
and opens her eyes.  
  
* * * *  
  
She immediately regrets it when the light floods into her  
brain and explodes like a supernova, electrical impulses  
going haywire as Scully struggles to adjust to the  
brightness. Her stomach protests against the visual assault,  
and for a wild dizzy moment it feels as though her digestive  
system is turning inside out, or that her gut is trying to  
crawl up her oesophagus, or something strange and  
equally mind-altering.  
  
And then there is calm, a hand on her forehead, soothing  
words that she can't quite make out over the confusion in  
her head. Calmness really is the colour of blue, a light,  
multifaceted cerulean tinged with greyish teal. Centering  
her focus onto that colour, the fever dream soon fades into  
the ocean of her mind. She gazes into blueness and swims  
back to the surface.  
  
"Agent Scully?" A voice somewhere out of the blurred scope  
of her vision asks. "Agent Scully, it's me." She stares at  
him with so much puzzlement in her eyes that he looks as  
though he is compelled to add, "John Doggett."  
  
"I -- I know, I didn't forget you." How could she, when it  
was those eyes that pulled her to the shore? She is still  
gripping his hand and pulls away slowly, shaking her head to  
clear the cobwebs. "For a moment there I thought --"  
  
Her first instinct is to say that she thought he was a  
telephone receiver, but of course she isn't going to say  
that aloud.  
  
Something flickers in his eyes. They both know what he  
thinks she meant. "S'all right," he says. "How're you  
feelin'?" He places the washcloth on the bedside table. She  
pulls herself up with a tentative slowness and he reaches  
for her, supporting the weight she can't quite catch with  
her fatigued muscles. Scully smiles weakly in thanks,  
noting the tidy way Doggett folded the handtowel and  
positioned it in a neat row with her medication, her  
thermometer, and a glass of water.  
  
"Fever's broken," she states. Her gaze falls to his large  
gentle hands as they move away, and she focuses her  
attention to the weave of fabric stretched over his shoulder  
as he moves back and sits beside her. Just barely keeping  
his distance.  
  
"Yeah. You want anything?"  
  
"No, I'm okay," she says, surveying the bedside table. "You  
thought of everything, for now," she adds, reaching for the  
water and taking a tentative sip. He watches her closely.  
The water manages to stay down.  
  
"Some dream you were having just now," he comments, picking  
up the washcloth again. Scully begins to protest, but he  
quells her with a firm look. He runs the towel gently over  
her face again, wiping away every last trace of the fever.  
She feels pampered, foolish, utterly and totally cared  
for. Studying him, she realises that his movements are  
practised and fluid, and she is oddly surprised.  
  
Lightly she grips his wrist as he moves back, plucking the  
towel away with her free hand and curling her fingers around  
his palm. It's the illness, she justifies to herself,  
lowering her defences and thus her inhibitions. It's the  
only way she can explain away the fact that she's quite  
literally holding his hand. "You've done this before," she  
says to him. Almost accusing.  
  
Doggett throws her a perplexed half smile, his eyes still  
shadowed with concern. "I've taken care of people before."  
  
"I don't doubt that." Questions linger on her tongue, but  
he's too close, and she's still holding onto him. She  
observes the careful way his hand is surrounding hers, and  
decides that one day she *would* like those gentle  
fingertips to rotate at her temples, soothing away the  
residual ache. Maybe one day soon, she could bring herself  
to ask.  
  
Need for honesty makes her look up to meet his calm blue  
gaze -- she needs to tell him that it wasn't grief that made  
her ill, but even if it certainly didn't help. "Agent  
Doggett," she begins, "I'm -- I'm not ill because I haven't  
been taking care of myself."  
  
"I know. I understand." Of course he does: he's been  
observing her so carefully that he would leap in himself if  
he thought she wasn't.  
  
She still tries to explain it anyway. "I don't want you to  
think --"  
  
"Agent Scully, it's all right." Doggett's gaze is serious  
and direct, and she knows that he isn't hiding any doubts  
from her. Scully suspects he understands more than she's  
given him credit for so far.  
  
"Okay," she answers, and they stare for a moment, silently  
contemplating each other. Scully wonders if, now that she's  
awake and relatively aware, he will take that as a cue that  
he isn't needed anymore. She hopes not.  
  
"Don't want to leave you 'til I'm sure you're okay," he  
finally says, and she sees an odd sort of longing in his  
eyes, as though he is not sure he wants to leave her at all.  
  
Her small sigh of relief is completely involuntary. She  
squeezes his hand gently. "Agent Doggett?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"I think I'm okay to get up now," she says slowly. "But  
could you stay a little while longer? I mean, here?"  
  
Faint surprise flickers across Doggett's face. You just  
picked up the phone, Scully's subconscious mind tells her.  
It's an absurd thought, one she doesn't remember the source  
of, and it contributes largely to the gentle smile that  
creeps onto her face.  
  
He smiles back, and she hears him this time around. "All  
right," he says. "I'll stay."  
  
* * * *  
  
The long, soothing shower washes away all the last lingering  
traces of her fever, and her clothes feel absurdly fresh and  
clean when the smooth fabric touches her skin. Her mind is  
calm and blue, no ringing at all. Scully wanders out to find  
Doggett sitting on her couch, focus etched into his face,  
and she realises that the buzzing of cars on the television  
screen is just loud enough to drown out the sounds of water  
running.  
  
"Who's winning?"  
  
"It's a replay."  
  
"Oh. Who won?"  
  
She sits next to him on the couch. It doesn't feel as  
awkward as her mind tells her it should. Scully looks at her  
partner and sees him for who he is, not for who she once  
thought he would try to replace.  
  
A few companionable moments later Scully insists on taking  
her own temperature, she all she does is look at him in the  
silence that comes of an mercury bulb stuck firmly under her  
tongue. Doggett catches her eye and looks vaguely amused,  
slightly nostalgic for something she can't define, before  
turning his gaze to the screen as a car tumbles and spins  
into the air. They wince in unison and breathe a sigh of  
relief when the driver walks out unscathed.  
  
"I knew that would happen," Doggett defends himself slightly  
when Scully shoots him an arch look. "It's a *re*play."  
  
She rolls her eyes and pulls the thermometer out from her  
mouth. There's a faint tinny sound in her ears. "A hundred,"  
she finally says, holding the slim glass rod up to the light  
and tracing the path of silver with her gaze.  
  
He leans over to get a closer look. "That's okay. For now."  
  
"I just have to sleep the rest off."  
  
Accepting her diagnosis, he nods and switches off the  
television. The faint ringing that had started to rebuild  
fades. "Do you feel like eating?"  
  
"Not yet," she admits, looking at her watch. "Maybe in about  
an hour." Her stomach feels calmer now, and she could  
probably succeed in eating a horse if she felt like it. Only  
thing is, she doesn't.  
  
"All right. Get some rest. I'll see about gettin' you  
something to eat," he adds, standing up.  
  
"*Not* pizza." Her sense of balance churns at the thought.  
  
"I can cook. I'll fix something for you. Chicken soup,  
even."  
  
She tips her head, curious but unsurprised. Scully has seen  
Doggett sleeping in the shell of an idyllic domesticity. She  
doesn't doubt for a second that he could probably  
outcook her if she challenged him.  
  
"Thank you," she says, and she means it for today, for  
the last few weeks, few months, everything.  
  
They look at each other for a long moment. He doesn't seem  
to want to walk away, not yet. "Agent Scully?" he asks  
quietly.  
  
"Yes, Agent Doggett?"  
  
"I do, you know that."  
  
She has no idea what he's talking about, but he says it with  
such conviction and sincerity that she believes him. "I  
know," she says simply. Her eyelids slip shut against his  
solemn nod and she drifts on dream again, knowing she won't  
float far with his presence to keep her grounded.  
  
A few moments pass before she hears his footsteps moving  
away, heading towards her kitchen. The world seems so much  
calmer to her, now that the brunt of the fever has passed  
and the pain in her head has lessened. She leans her head  
back into the couch and lets the soft sounds of Doggett  
moving around in her kitchen fade into the cool blueness in  
her mind.  
  
Somewhere in her head, the phones have all stopped ringing.  
  
~ END ~ 


End file.
